Category: Festival

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Festival Friends Rude Kids

Shindig 26

Its May! So must be time for Shindig Festival. Its a festival close to my heart, with a lot of friends involved and in attendance. I’ve been involved for a few years now, and i am slowly wallpapering over the site (theres lots of Dotmasters patterns over numerous sculptures)

This is a new DJ booth for Mojos bar. It was actually Mojos home for many a year as he travelled around Europe causing mayhem. The cab was cut and rebuilt for its new purpose by James Kearney James has numerous sculptures around the site along with old friends Wrekon.

A few things i’ve painted over the years needed re doing, stored outside for a few years will do that to us all. So it was time to re-blandalise some love and peace missiles (old fuel tanks from war planes). The red ones the newly painted one.

Mojo, gets some odd bits and pieces, and this years new additions were particularly odd. Giant wellington boots, about 3.5m tall. The weather for Shindig is often super nice but like we all know, a festival isn’t a festival without some wellies.

Its a cracking weekend, if you haven’t been GO! Family friendly and a bloody good party to boot (excuse the pun). A mix of music and art, food and frolics. I always have a cracking good time.

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collaboration Festival Friends norway Rude Kids street

Kål Festival

Visited Kristiansand a couple of weeks ago for the Kål Festival by good friend and the curator of the thing Vlek. Its a cool festival as they state on their website “The Art of Living is a festival that focuses on the connection between visual art and public health.
The festival addresses themes such as: freedom of expression, equality, inclusion and user participation.
The festival produces street art, organizes workshops and contributes to debates”

I was honoured to be asked as they have had some of my friends an heroes paint around the town in previous years the likes of Roa, Issac Cordel, Cbloxx, Dot Dot Dot,Martin Whatson and Mark Jenkins and many more. So it was nice to make a mark in the same town as them. This year i was joined by Ben Eine, Espen Henningsen and Stay one as part of the festival.

First up before Ben landed was a piece i’d been working on for a while. Dritt is a less offensive Norwegian word for shit (the type of word a naughty kid would use). The wall was a makeshift hodge podge of re bar and ply in a tumble down plot behind the theatre. We chopped down the undergrowth with a chainsaw and dodged our way around the rubble and the holes. The new rude kids had posed for each letter back in London, their names are from left to right Rudi, Jaigo, Boudica Wren and Sadhbh. Thanks as ever for the kids patience while i took their photographs for the studies for the works.

It took a while but i even managed to pop a Rude kid up high, his name is Laser Ray.

Then Ben arrived and we set about a large wall in town, by Smash burger (which we lived out of (great burgers)). We were blessed with great weather! Working quickly we knocked it out in a day.

Onto the power station that was trackside for another days painting.
Rose and Lilly with their Father Ted phrases seemed to fit perfectly on a set of stairs by a power station (careful now!).

Finally we headed out of town to paint in a place that reminded me of Tou Scene in Stavanger but instead of beer this factory produced paper, the company was Hunsfos Fabrikker on Hunsøya island in Vennesla since re purposed as hive of cultural production. I Adapted my new Rude Kids Wren, Rudi, Sadhbh and Rudi to write a more acceptable word for the small creative community thats grown within the factorys grounds.

It was a great week in a lovely town with good friends. We came we saw we painted. Thanks to Arne for all his hard work and super slick production. We left our marks and hoped the locals liked them.

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Festival street

Waterford Walls

What a wonderful week in Ireland, thanks to all the crew that made the week a slick production experience. A special thanks to Gabe, John, Kerri, Luke, Raphael, Madison and Soak7. There were more involved of course but as an old tipsy man my memory fails me. I haven’t experienced such a shared responsibility amongst a team for a long time, congratulations to all of you, you should be proud of what we all achieved.
I cut some new things specially for the festival that were a bit out of my usual schtick. Hope they worked for the local audience as they were cut for you.

Photo by Street Art Atlas
Photo by Street Art Atlas

The kneecap image was mediated thing i have ever painted, i’m a plastic Paddy (london irish) married to a Dubliner, taking a provocative image from a Northern Irish band to a southern Irish graffiti festival, i planned to just paint it around the place on unsanctioned walls and not ask permission. However with all the other factors that i’ve mentioned, i actually checked with all involved to see if i wasn’t stepping on too many toes. The band and the festival said yes and with the wife happy i was not being a bull in a china shop i was set.

I only explain this background to temper the uk interpretation of this image . I am not ignorant of an irish dialogue which may make this image problematic. But as a street artist its more of a tribute to Mr B’s flower thrower than anything else. It is after all me in a tracksuit pulling the same pose with a can of paint.

Faced with that, the location Waterford and the whole street art shtick. I thought of doing it my way with a localised message . It was first painted in much hit spot in Jenkins lane car park, keeping the look of a tagged wall to contextualise the tagging that is bound to appear after i have left. Thought i’d contribute to their wall than go over it with something more mural like .

Photo by Street Art Atlas

I painted it a second time at the Waterford walls paint jam. I love a good knackered wall, something with a personality. There were a loads of great charcoal drawings and kids chalk drawings all over it and i thought i could add a couple of kids or something would of added to what was already there. The artist i ended up going over was a nice guy called Maurice Caplice who drew the seahorse, he explained a French girl had written the Free Palestine on the wall and the spot for DJ Próvai was found.

Photo by me

Rather than paint a mural in the town, Waterford walls were kind enough to find some smaller spots dotted around town. Its a big ask, a lot more talking to folk and finding walls that work with my style. But they pulled it out of the bag with 8 or 9 nice folk that allowed me to pop up some old fashioned street hits.

A big thanks to Hannah Judah and Street Art Atlas who captured my visit. Thanks to Hannah for my inclusion in her wonderful book signing ( check it out, available from all your usual suppliers ). Thanks you too all those who came and suffered my quite sweary artist presentation. Sorry! Had a great week, painted a fair bit, drank a little too much, i blame the Buzzballs!

Photo by Street Art Atlas
Photo by Street Art Atlas
Photo by Street Art Atlas

The Kid above is actually called Luca and is an old friend of the family. He’s a bit sweary but the coincidence was appriciated by the nice guys in the record shop.

Lads from the oldest tattoo shop in town. Thanks guys. Photo by me.
Photo by Street Art Atlas
Photo by Street Art Atlas

Made a few weird versions of the Dj Provi stencil on some old newspapers that are available online at Stella Dore if your interested.

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Festival group show show

Vandal Fest York

I just got back from York working on the show for Vandal Fest organised by Vandals at Work. Vandals At Work is a York-based non-profit community arts organisation with a passion for street art and a belief that art should do more than just hang on walls and look pretty, it should inform, spark conversations and be a call to action. We believe art can be a powerful force for good in our community.

They aim to enrich our city’s cultural landscape by organising exhibitions, auctions, and other events that enable us to raise money for local charities and help support the artists we collaborate with. To date, we’ve worked with more than sixty artists and have donated over £55,000 to three local charities, York Food Bank, York Mind and SASH (Youth Homelessness).

Street art returns to the Low Ousegate building in the centre of York. Kindly donated by Mack & Lawler. Our next event opens on 11th July 2025 and will span four storeys of the unoccupied building, featuring the work of an exciting group of world-class street artists alongside a cohort of local artists.

Show opens tonight Friday 11th of July, is open this weekend and the following two weekends.

A whistle stop trip to York to contribute to a very cool show for a good cause in the centre of York. Three floors of cracking large scale wall based works, an immersive experience in a disused office block on the river in central York. A super slick production from a unique crew of volunteers. I had a fun trip, show looks stunning and it’s free to visit for 3 weekends during July. Well worth a visit if you are in the area.

Vandals at work are working with the team at Tennants Auctioneers again for the fourth year in a row. They will be running an online Vandal Fest auction with works donated by participating artists. If you can’t make it to the show this is your opportunity to acquire artwork by our participating artists, and support SASH. The auction will go live on 18th July and run until 3rd Aug check their site for details

Artists include :

3Dom, AcerOne, Al Murphy, Andy Council, Boxxhead, Chu, Coloquix, Dotmasters, Filthy Luker, Inkie, James Jessop, KMG, Lincoln Lightfoot, Matt Sewell, Michael Dawson, My Dog Sighs, Nol, Paste Up York, Real State, Replete, Rizak, Rowdy, Sepr, Sharon McDonagh, Shona Hardie, SledOne, Sola, Static, Stephen Bottrill, Sub Spacer, Toasters

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Festival Nuart street

Nuart 24

It was a with great pleasure i accepted an invite from my old friend Martyn Reid to participate in the Nuart festival in Stavanger Norway (They also do a Nuart Aberdeen ). I worked on this festival for over a decade being first invited as an exhibiting artist (when it was more of a New Media festival in 2004) and coming back year after year in a progression of roles from curator to artist and production manager. The year after we met Nuart started to focus on street art, the budget was small and the possibilities of painting round the city were non existent. We ended up painting some abandoned buildings in a down at heel part of town as well as staging a small show up at the arts centre Tou Scene in 2005.

Since then the Festival has grown, huge murals appeared around the town, logistics grew, cherry pickers were hired with a huge volunteer task force who’s amazing help allowed the thing to grow into a world leading festival of art on the street, drawing camera crews from CNN from the USA, Google it. With amazing artist line ups from across the globe, the curation of each years participants tells you a lot about the way street art has developed over the years, covering most aspects of public space art intervention. From situationalists to muralists, wheat paste to spray paint, key artists from the history of the medium as well as show casing the breadth of the techniques happening on the street today.

I did a decade of production and have visited them a few times as an artist over the years, so it with great pleasure to be invited back for this years ‘Intangible’ festival. A back to basics approach to urban mark making. A what you can carry method of production on un sanctioned spaces. Not a mural in sight. I have always been a fan of floor based works that you come across when walking round a town. It all seemed to start with that for me. Over the years people have worked out logistics for larger and larger works. Rollers on poles, fire extinguisher and extendable ladders, anything you could carry on public transport and then over fences but it rarely involved a cherry picker or a scissor lift.

For 5 days i wandered the city with a hi-viz popping up life size works, i used a ladder once… it was lovely. I have a good knowledge of the city built on my years of production of the festival which meant i had a good idea of places i wanted to paint and images i wanted to drop there. What a wonderful week thank you Stavanger, a sea of thumbs ups, Coffee and cake, even two six packs and a packet of fags! Most importantly i didn’t get chased once.

A couple of things didn’t fit the walls chosen, and were painted over, sorry for that. But i think that much of it will stay and brings a certain something to the places chosen, but like all street art it’s councils and maintenance contracts that are the curators of our public space.

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Festival Nuart street Uncategorized

Nuart 2019

It was nice to be asked back to Nuart after a few years away from Stavanger. As i used to work on production for the festival, the visit was radically different to my previous years experiences. Coupled with the fact i was painting my new Gaffa-tape “Stick em” up series, it gave me a fresh pair of eyes to see the town and festival. No cherry pickers, no assistants and no confirmed walls meant i was free to wander the town and paint these little pieces on doors and electrical cabinets at my own pace.

  • Picture by Runa Andersen

In my opinion, the placement of art on the street is often key to the work’s success, both visually and, often, in terms of its longevity. It’s a dynamic that is hard to re-create during a festival, as artists from all over the world descend on a town or city with pre-ordered paint, ideas and walls. With artists wanting to go large, festivals wanting a mark worthy of the booking and a city wanting eye-candy to brighten its darkest corners, that placement is often overlooked. As a producer, i am only too well aware of the conflict between all the interests, the art form and its roots. So it was great when Martyn Reed offered a retro way of working for my trip to Nuart 2019.

Photo by Runa Andersen

A map showing the spots painted over the 4 days in town.

Nuart is a festival close to my heart, it’s always great fun and the shows in the beer halls at Tou have been some of my proudest production moments. It’s always a great crew thats easy to work with and a real party feeling for the week or two that you’re there. Loved a lot of the work around me and it was a pleasure to be asked back to take part

Above Oscar and Gabriel, local rude kids who have grown up with Nuart and who i’ve know through the festival since birth. This year they made it into the show.

  • Photo by Runa Andersen
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Festival film Nuart

Take your pick

I am sure you all know that feeling… After a big night out, you wake in the morning with that horrible feeling of dread and guilt at what has gone on the night before…Then you realise you probably got away with it? Then you remember you had a camera crew with you… Good job they are very good friends!

MZM PROJECTS” is an independent group formed in Ukraine by Kristina Borhes and Nazar Tymoshchuk, focused on research and documentation of the street art, graffiti, post-graffiti and other artistic practices in urban culture.

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Competition Festival treasure hunt

Competition Time!!

I moved studios recently after 8 years…with 8 years worth of tat, cardboard tubes, knick knacks and trash. Some of this stuff i just haven’t got room for, some i am tired looking at it and some of it’s therapeutic. So its Competition Time! All you have to do is Photograph yourself under this flashing arrow behind East Croydon Station.

A few weeks ago for the #CroydonRising festival Croydon Council backed the installation of my I AM HERE sign See below :


Id like you to get your self down to Croydon ( details below ) Strike a pose! Be Fabulous… or not…make yourself known or at least memorable! Be imaginative? Be bold, brave, but be seen! Look at the lovely prizes on offer today!

 In order to WIN!


50 x 50 test spray for larger diet life work

Silkscreen on Babinga veneer, 1m x 55cm


Ruler in for scale 1.5x 3.2m on fabrino paper robbie the robot test spray

detail

Ruler in for scale! Test spray on fabrino paper 2.1m x 1.5m
Mr potato test spray


A4 size work on aluminium

All you have to do make  a post of yourself under the sign to win one of a number of the above work and prints. There are 5 prizes so and they will be given to the most deserving entry. Either Instagram, Facebook or Twitter, @Dotmasters with #IAMHERE #Croydon Rising

or email it to: info[ at ] dotmaster.co.uk    with subject #IAMHERE

Competition ends 19th of October Winners announced 23rd Oct.

You gotta be in it to win it!

HOW TO FIND IT

Its a regeneration zone so things change quickly round there, its of a new walkway off Dingwall road in Croydon that runs parallel with the tracks of East Croydon station

So heres the  map location https://goo.gl/maps/PNbpvwjsEKS2

if you coming by train as you get off the train Its at the last left hand exit facing away from the station. and back into London , down the steps from the walkway  and its in front of the steps.

I Believe there is a Croydon Rising App that helps you find all the new work around town here https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/rise-festival/id1420023039?mt=8

 

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Festival Fuiji Rock Festival Japan Mutoid waste department travel

Unfairground Fuji Rock 2018

When we found out there was no Glastonbury 2018 we decided to take the Unfairground on tour. Having presented some of the sideshows in the Palace of Wonder (the late night spot at Fuji Rock) in 2012, when Glastonbury last rested the land, It seemed only natural to take the whole motley crew off to Naeba for 2018’s 20th anniversary of Fuji rock !

 For our Japanese trip we recruited Unfairground favourites Ben Eine and Inkie on painting duties as well as Local legend Masagon and Myself. We packed Sam Haggerty’s sculptures into a shipping container or two and sent them off to Japan in May.


Pryratrix Circus Joined us to help entertain the crowds, with Born on road, Jagz Kooner and Jack from Children of acid providing the tunes for the weekend. In all a Uncrew of 50 headed off for the mountains of Naeba, taking a slice of site life to fields of Fuji rock.


Ben Eine mixes it up

Inkie’s kongee

Masagon went Dotty

And Dotty went freehand.
With the hottest weather on record, the Unfairground crew melted across the old Orange court. Thankfully The Typhoon that hit us Saturday night didn’t cause too much damage. We’d like to Thank Naeba and Yuzawa councils for inviting us, Smash go round for making it all happen and Bryan burton lewis for being so special. Thanks to all who came, threw some shapes and tagged us in those million photos that got taken! Thanks Guys it was real!



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Festival Friends Glastonbury murals Press sideshow

Unfairground 17

Ahhh, Glastonbury, It’;s a double edged sword. An obstacle course through a chaotic fairground. Due to the Cannes lions gig appearing in the middle of my usual build, work started early in June, dragging the sideshows out, fixing trailers, building 28 foot mouths the usual thing for a uncrew carnie . Each year we ask a new artist to paint the hoardings in the unfairground. I’ve know Inkie for many years and thought his style would give a post victorian edge to our twisted fairground setting.

This year i brought a new sideshow, Small fortunes, Dystopian futures that favour the unfair! Cross there palms in silver and delve into the future from our resident fortune tellers the Queens of the Underworld and Ted’s Walker. We had queues of the curious leaving satified if not perplexed.

We had a cracking year, with the misery of the previous years festival forgotten. No one can remember a hotter build, a fuller or friendlier festival. We had a Cracker!

Usual thanks to all the Uncrew! The folly family, our incredible production staff, everyone on the bars back stage and back! Jagz kooner, Bez, Scouse and fatty for the battle bus stage. OIf course for Sam Haggerty making it all happen in the first place and all those who came, watched the freak shows, danced and drank the night away or those that lost their shirts on the sideshows.

It was a cracking year, always a little Unfair but a bloody good laugh